The Fruits of Former Civilizations and the Blossoms of the Contemporary

“As for the third of the enumerated chemical substances they invented, namely, ‘cocaine,’ that chemical substance is not only also of great assistance to Nature in more rap- idly decomposing the planetary formations—in this in- stance, their own planetary bodies—but this chemical means has an effect on the psyche of the contemporary beings of the planet Earth surprisingly similar to that which the famous organ Kundabuffer had on the psyche of their ancestors.

“When their ancestors had that invention in themselves of the Great Angel Looisos, then, thanks to this organ, they were always exactly in the same state as the contemporary beings are when they introduce into themselves this German invention called cocaine.

“I must warn you, my boy, that even if the action of that German invention is similar to the action of the famous organ Kundabuffer, it happened without any conscious intention on the part of the contemporary beings of the community Germany; they became colleagues of the Great Angel Looisos only by chance.

“At the present time almost all the beings who become genuine representatives of contemporary civilization very meticulously and with the greatest delight and tenderness introduce into themselves this ‘blessing’ of contemporary civilization, of course, always to the glory, as our dear Mullah Nassr Eddin says, of the ‘cloven-hoofed.’

“The fourth of the enumerated chemical substances, namely, ‘atropine,’ is also everywhere there in great demand at the present time for a great variety of purposes; but its most common use is for a certain exceedingly strange purpose.

“It seems that thanks to the same abnormally established conditions there of ordinary being-existence, their organ of sight has acquired the property of regarding the faces of others as good and pleasing only when they have dark eyes.